Businesses looking to grow organically need to understand that marketing is not sales. Rather, it's a long-term investment that needs to be tracked by an advisor, said Crystal Mathis, chief marketing officer at SignatureFD.
“You have to understand that you’re in it for the long term,” she said. “A lot of people fall into the trap of, ‘I’m going to do this event and make a big deal and get clients from WAZOO.’ It doesn’t work that way.”
Mr. Mattis will be joined by Terra McBride, Chief Marketing Officer, Prime Capital Investment Advisors, Michelle Panzella, Director of Marketing, Evensky & Katz/Foldes, and Chief Marketing Officer, Wealthspire Advisors. We discussed how marketing can drive organic growth for advisory firms with Angela Giombetti, a leading consultant. WealthStack, part of Wealth Management EDGE, was held last week at the Diplomat Beach Resort in Hollywood Beach, Florida.
McBride said Prime Capital Investment Advisors allows advisors to experiment with marketing strategies. It then tracks how well each one works. Typically, firms support 25% of the cost of the initiative, so both the firm and the advisor are involved.
“We know that different strategies work for different advisors. We have many strategies to choose from,” she said. “Data doesn't matter. It's just a million facts in a bucket. We need to connect their data so they can get more information and make informed decisions. there is.”
Giambetti said marketing itself has evolved over the past five to 10 years: initially it was all about branding and brand awareness, but more recently the rise of digital campaigns has driven marketing and business development together.
“The lines of what we are responsible for are now very blurred,” she says.
McBride said one way to incentivize advisors to create more organic growth is to leverage their natural competitive advantages.
“When they log into their dashboards, they can see each other's positions. And they're like, 'Oh, I went from second to third place,'” she said. “Giving them the space to do that was really helpful.”
Panzella said he encourages advisors to play to their strengths and do more of what they're good at to achieve results.
“If you have an idea of what works, it's easier to get approval and experiment,” she said.
Even with all these different methods, there needs to be an overarching goal guiding everything, Panzella says.
“There should be a pyramid with a goal at the top,” she said. “LinkedIn is a distribution channel, not a strategy. It requires a broad-based strategy at the top level.”
Giombetti said that no matter what choice is made, subsequent actions that keep the conversation going are critical to the success of the tactic.
“No effort is a one-time endeavor. If you spend time on an event, what is the follow-up after that? What is an infusion campaign?” she said.
Mattis said this allows back-end advisors to ramp up early efforts without additional up-front costs.
“You can make one piece for the same amount of money and keep recycling it over and over again,” she said. “You can do it in conjunction with SEO.”
